I will let you know that I am editing and proofreading from now on to help assure that my words come across more closely to what I am thinking. My stream-of-conscious writing is what got me in trouble in the first place.

Along those lines, my former agent told me that I would be better off to just keep my mouth shut and let everything blow over, but I can’t do that when I feel my words were taken the wrong way. I feel like I have to better explain.

If you have followed MMAjunkie.com, you know that I do not do my columns on any sort of normal schedule. When I have something fight-related that I think readers would be interested in knowing, I sit down and write a column. I decided early on that I did not want to re-read them and edit my thoughts. Instead, I’d just wait till the guys edit my column and post it on MMAjunkie.com, and that’s when I’d read it for the first time myself. I did this because I did not want to second guess myself or start to worry about what people might think or say negatively about me. Obviously, that has proven to be a mistake.

The point of my last column was to discuss how miserable I was when I was going into my June 6 fight with Allan Weickert and how I was using my future fight that was orignially going to be with Dante Rivera as an excuse to start putting my life back together.

I was using my column as a way to talk to other people that were dealing with personal problems and hiding from them through alcohol the same way I was. I was talking all those people who were giving up on themselves the same way I was and trying to motivate them, letting them know that you can take one thing in your life (such as a fight) as an excuse to stop self-destructing and put things back together. Despite all the problems the column caused, I do believe that I have reached some of those people because I have gotten several emails from readers (including soldiers) who have said they were in a similar situation in which they were giving up on themselves and were using my column as motivation to turn things around.

I chose the wrong words in talking about my fight with Weickert because that was not the point of the column and more of an afterthought in my mind. Now that everything has been taken the wrong way, I will explain it the way I should have the first time.

In hindsight, I should have called the promoter weeks earlier and explained that I was dealing with too much in my personal life and just backed out of the fight. Instead, I put on my tough-guy face and tried to convince myself that I would win no matter what.

The fact is that Allan Weickert fought his ass off in the first round. He didn’t care about anything else except beating my ass. He made things very hard on me, and between rounds, I couldn’t keep the thoughts of everything else I was dealing with out of my head. I wasn’t looking for a way to lose. I just knew at that exact moment in my life there were a million places that I would have rather been. Weickert put me in an arm-bar. If you watch the video, I did not pull my arm out and put it back in, as I made it sound in my last column. I honestly have no idea why I described it that way. It was a tight arm-bar, but I do feel that if I would have fought my ass off (the way I should have), I could have gotten out of it.

But I quit. I took the cowardly way out of it. I disrespected the sport by coming to the cage mentally unprepared.

If you have read my columns before, you know that I do not make excuses for my losses, and that was not my intention this time. My column is about the things that I go through as a fighter, and that was what I was explaining. Weickert beat me fairly and squarely.

If you are reading this Allan, I sincerely apologize to you, your coaches, and family. It was never my intention to take away from your win. In hindsight I see how it looks like that is exactly what I was trying to do.

I would also like to address the people that have suggested that I may have bet on the fight. This is absolutely not true. I assume that the Ohio Athletic Commission checked on that, but you can search the globe and will not find anywhere that myself or anyone I know benefited in any way by me losing that fight.

I already apologized to Allan and his people, but obviously I have a couple more apologies.

I want to apologize to Greg Kalikas and the NAAFS for all the headaches that this has all caused. The NAAFS is a great organization to fight for and one that is very good for the sport

Lou Neglia (the promoter for Ring of Combat) is also owed an apology. I was suppose to fight on his Sept. 11 card, but the commision took me off the lineup until this situation gets cleared up. Lou is a great guy to fight for, and I truly hope he gives me another shot.

I also owe Tom Yerace of UMMAXX an apology. I was scheduled to fight for him on the promotion’s October card, but also because of this, the commission took me off that card.

And to everyone else, I sincerely apologize. Looking back, I can see how and why my words were taken the way they were, and I chose them carelessly.

Obviously this situation has caused a lot of problems for me, but it has also taught me a lot. The biggest one is to face your problems head on.

Self-destruction should never be an option when things are not going your way. I will never take a fight when I know I’m not mentally prepared, and furthermore, I will never quit on myself again. Last, I will really proofread and think about every column from now on. I hope that doesn’t cause me to second-guess what I am trying to say, but rather, just assure that my words illustrate what I mean.

I am sure that this mess has cost me a lot, if not all my fans, and I am sorry about that. (Unfortunately, I do care what people think of me.) But I am going to continue to press forward.

Sean Salmon (16-8) is an MMAjunkie.com columnist who occasionally pens his Fulltime Fighter column for the site. The column is designed to give readers a behind-the-scenes look at a professional fighter’s career and the ups and downs of the profession. If you have a question for Salmon, leave it in the comments section of the post. He answers all respectful queries.

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